My two earlier columns about the lists I prepared thirty-five years ago for the Canadian Book of Lists prompted a number of requests to reproduce some of the other interesting lists from the book. Here are the ones I’ve chosen; and, although none of these lists was prepared by me, I have added some parenthetical editorial comments.
The Ten Best Performing Canadian Stocks
1. Amalgamated Bonanza Petroleum
2. Nowsco Well Service
3. Wainco Oil
4. Harlequin Enterprises
5. Daon Development
6. Woodsreef Minerals
7. BX Development
8. Quasar Petroleum
9. OPI Ltd.
10. Stampede Int’l Resources
The Ten Most Powerful Businessmen In Canada
(Note that women weren’t even contemplated)
1. Robert Blair (CEO, Alberta Gas Trunk Line)
2. Conrad Black (President, Argus Corporation)
3. Paul Desmarais (CEO, Power Corporation)
4. K.C. Irving (Founder of the Irving group of companies)
5. Charles Bronfman (Chairman of Executive Committee of Seagrams)
6. Ian Sinclair (CEO, Canadian Pacific Ltd.)
7. A. Ephraim Diamond (CEO, Cadillac Fairview)
8. Thomas Bata (President, Bata Ltd.)
9. John Henderson Moore (CEO, Brascan)
10. John Patrick Gallagher (CEO, Dome Petroleum)
(It’s interesting that none of them were with a company that was on the list of the ten best performing stocks.)
The Ten Most Sought After Canadian Broadcast Performers
1. Pierre Berton
2. Dave Broadfoot
3. Fred Davis
4. Don Harron
5. Tommy Hunter
6. Betty Kennedy
7. Anne Murray
8. Gordon Pinsent
9. Gordon Sinclair
10. Charles Templeton
(When I inquired why Anne Murray, who wasn't a broadcaster, was on this list I was told it was because of the overwhelmingly popularity of her annual TV specials.))
The Fifteen Best Canadian Performers
(In alphabetical order, as different genres were represented it would have been impossible to rank them))
1. Dave Broadfoot
2. Jean Carignan (A fiddler from Quebec)
3. Maureen Forrester
4. Glenn Gould
5. Don Harron
6. Pauline Julien (A Quebec singer)
7. Karen Kain
8. Monique Leyrac (A Quebec singer/actress)
9. Gordon Lightfoot
10. Anne Murray
11. Oscar Peterson
12. The Travellers
13. Jon Vickers
14. Gilles Vigneault (A Quebec poet)
15. Wayne and Shuster
(Jean Carignan, Pauline Julien, Monique Leyrac and Gilles Vigneault were virtually unknown outside the province of Quebec, but the Canadian Book of Lists would never have been published were it not “politically correct.”)
A few more interesting lists next week.