John Bassett
John Bassett | |
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| Born | John White Hughes Bassett August 25, 1915 |
| Died | April 27, 1998 (aged 82) |
| Occupation(s) | Media proprietor, politician |
| Awards | Order of Canada Order of Ontario |
John White Hughes Bassett, PC CC OOnt (August 25, 1915 – April 27, 1998) was a Canadian media proprietor.
Born in
Education
Bassett attended Ashbury College, Bishop's College School[1] and graduated from Bishop's University with a BA in 1936.
Politics
After fighting with the Army in
Publishing and broadcasting
He became a
Sports
From 1957 to 1974, Bassett was the owner of the Toronto Argonauts, a team in the Canadian Football League.
In 1957, he was named to the "Silver Seven," a committee that oversaw hockey operations for the Toronto Maple Leafs. In 1961, longtime Maple Leafs owner Conn Smythe sold most of his shares in Maple Leaf Gardens Ltd. (which owned the Maple Leafs and Maple Leaf Gardens) to a partnership of his son Stafford, Toronto Marlboros president Harold Ballard and Bassett for $2.3 million. Smythe later claimed that he thought he was selling only to his son, but it is very unlikely that Stafford would have been able to raise the money on his own. Bassett became vice chairman of the Gardens' board of directors, ascending as chairman after Smythe resigned shortly after the Leaf’s won the Stanley Cup in 1962. Bassett's name appears on the Stanley Cup 4 times—in 1962, 1963, 1964, 1967.
In 1969, Ballard and Stafford Smythe were charged with tax evasion and accused of using Maple Leaf Gardens Ltd. to pay for their personal expenses. Bassett persuaded the board to fire Smythe as president and Ballard as executive vice president. The board elected Bassett as the new president.
However, Bassett did not force Smythe and Ballard to sell their shares, and they both remained on the board. This was a serious strategic blunder on Bassett's part; Smythe was still the largest shareholder, and he and Ballard controlled almost half the shares between them. A year later, Ballard and Smythe staged a proxy war to win back control. Faced with an untenable situation, Bassett resigned and sold his shares to Smythe and Ballard.
Bassett's son, John F. Bassett, would follow in his father's path of becoming a professional sports owner; the younger Bassett was a part owner of the World Hockey Association's Ottawa Nationals, Toronto Toros and Birmingham Bulls; the World Football League's Memphis Southmen and the United States Football League's Tampa Bay Bandits.
Government
In 1989, he was appointed for a three-year term as chairman of the
Family
Bassett married fellow Bishop's University graduate Eleanor Moira Bradley of Sherbrooke on April 26, 1938, in the University's St. Mark's Chapel.[3] They had three children: John, Doug, and David. After their divorce, Bassett married Isabel Bassett on July 17, 1967.[4] They had three children (Avery, Sarah, and Matthew) and remained together until his death.
In the 1970s, his son
Honours
- 1985 - Made an Officer of the Order of Canada.
- 1988 - Appointed to the Order of Ontario.
- 1989 - Appointed to the Queen's Privy Council for Canada.
- 1992 - Promoted to Companion of the Order of Canada.
- 2000 - Inducted into the Canadian Broadcast Hall of Fame.
- 2003 - Inducted into the Canadian Business Hall of Fame.
See also
References
- ^ "BCS Yearbook 1955".
- ^ "An Officer and a Journalist". Ryerson Review of Journalism. The Ryerson School of Journalism. Archived from the original on 2016-03-05.
- ^ "BASSETT-BRADLEY" Archived 2018-06-25 at the Wayback Machine collections2.banq.qc.ca (transcript of the April 28, 1938 The Record) June 24, 2018
- ^ "Isabel Glenthorne Macdonald" bassettbranches.org June 24, 2018
External links
Office of the Governor General of Canada. Order of Canada citation. Queen's Printer for Canada. Retrieved 24 May 2010
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