Stanley Maxted

Stanley Maxted (21 August 1895 – 10 May 1963) was a British-Canadian soldier, singer, radio producer, journalist and actor. He worked for the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) and later for the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) as a war correspondent during World War II. Following the war, he became an actor.

Maxted was a British home child who came to Toronto, Ontario, Canada in 1906 via Fegan Homes. He enlisted in 1915 and fought in World War I. Twice wounded and gassed during the First World War, he survived and became a singer. In the 1930s, he began working for the CBC as a journalist.

Maxted was seconded to work for the BBC in England during the Second World War. Maxted was present at on D-Day and the Battle of Arnhem alongside fellow BBC reporter Guy Byam and newspaper reporters Alan Wood of the '' Daily Express'' and Jack Smyth of Reuters. Maxted later covered the war in the Pacific in 1945, which he described as more difficult than reporting from Europe due to the distances covered.

Early life

Stanley Herbert Maxted was born on 21 August 1895 in Folkestone, Kent, England to Fanny Emma (née Sanderson) and Herbert Hope Maxted. After his parents' marriage failed, he was taken into care by Fegan Homes (founded by the nonconformist evangelist J. W. C. Fegan) and immigrated to Canada in 1906. Contrary to Fegan's policy of placing young boys on farms to serve as labourers, Maxted boarded as a teenager with the family of Dr. Malcolm Sparrow, a prominent dentist and amateur tenor residing in the Parkdale district of Toronto. Living with the Sparrows afforded Maxted the opportunity to attend Toronto's Parkdale Collegiate Institute, where he won two scholarships and excelled in sports. Maxted also reportedly studied singing privately under the tutelage of the renowned voice instructor Otto Morando.

Following high school, Maxted began forestry studies at the University of Toronto, but war was mounting in Europe and he only completed one term before dropping out to enlist.

Military service and early career

Stanley Maxted enlisted in the Canadian Expeditionary Force at Toronto on 10 February 1915. He named his mother, Mrs. Fanny Maxted of Folkestone, Kent, England, as his next of kin on his attestation papers. Maxted was assigned to Eaton's Machine Gun Battery upon his enlistment, and was promoted to the rank of corporal before departing for England with his battalion in June 1915. By a great coincidence, upon arrival in England, Maxted was based in his hometown of Folkestone for training. In December 1915, Maxted received a commission as a lieutenant in the British Royal Field Artillery. Maxted arrived in France on 1 March 1916, and immediately saw action. He was wounded three times throughout the war. In September 1916, he suffered injuries to his back when a heavy timber fell on him after a shell blast. On 31 July 1917 he received a bullet wound to his right thigh and suffered from the effects of gas. And then on 6 October 1917 during the Battle of Passchendaele he was gassed a second time, causing long term respiratory problems and rendering him speechless for a time. Maxted returned to Canada on 14 February 1918, and stayed with the Sparrow family to convalesce. After his recovery, he was sent on home assignment to CFB Borden, and honorably discharged in January 1919 with the rank of lieutenant.

Finding employment in post-war Canada was a challenge, so later in 1919 Maxted headed south to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania in the United States, where he found work as an oven builder for the booming steel town coke industry. Maxted spent three years living in Pittsburgh, where he was eventually promoted to a foreman. However, he found the work exacerbated his lingering respiratory problems caused by gas exposure, so he returned to Canada where he engaged in sales for the lumber industry.

While living at Montreal in the late 1920s, Maxted joined the 27th Field Battery reserve force of the Canadian Field Artillery. By 1928, he was promoted to the rank of captain, and by 1929, he held the rank of major.

Singing and radio career

After returning to Canada, Maxted began to actively explore singing once again, reportedly on the advice of a doctor to help strengthen his lungs. By 1927, Maxted was gaining prominence as a tenor in Montreal and began performing regularly with the Montreal Elgar Choir.

By 1929, Maxted was rising in fame on the Canadian national music scene, especially as a performer of A. A. Milne's poetry collection ''When We Were Very Young'', which had been set to music by Harold Fraser-Simson. Maxted received high praise from critics across the country for his humor and artistry in singing Milne's works. Augustus Bridle, the arts critic for the Toronto Daily Star, who himself had been a British Home Child, wrote of Maxted: "He has a delightful voice, as ductile as spun glass in the making." In the fall of 1929, Stanley Maxted was a featured performer in the Canadian Pacific Railway Concert Series, which saw him performing the A.A. Milne works on tour in major cities across the country.

In 1930, Maxted signed a contract with the Columbia Broadcasting System in New York City, singing live on five different radio programs weekly. Maxted also continued to perform regularly for Canadian audiences. One of his biggest concert events was performing for a broadcast on 1 June 1931 aboard the maiden voyage of the new Canadian Pacific ship RMS ''Empress of Britain'', billed as the largest and fastest ship travelling between England and Canada.

In 1933, Maxted's health forced him to return to Toronto, where he took a position as a regional program director with the Canadian Radio Commission (the immediate precursor of the CBC). In an article published in the Ottawa Citizen in November 1933, Maxted gave advice to other radio singers: "Sing the good things whenever you can. Sing in concert as often as possible, for radio tends to give a man a small voice." After joining the Canadian Radio Commission, Maxted continued to perform at concerts across North America, and even began composing his own songs as well.

In May 1937, six months after the formation of the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, Maxted went to London, England to work with commercial radio interests. He returned to Canada in September 1939 at the outset of World War II.

WWII journalist

At the start of the second world war, Maxted produced the ''Carry On, Canada!'' radio show for the CBC, which used short radio dramas to encourage Canadian men to join the army and others to donate to the war effort. In October 1940, Maxted was loaned from the CBC to the BBC
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