GG The Canadianness of Glenn Gould

["Megan, Ken and Anne" <smithqa@nexicom.net>]

Dear F Minors,

Birgette wrote: "The Canadianness of Gould" is a vital component that has
thus far been underexplored and should have played a bigger part in the
official bio."

On this theme:

We all know that Glenn Gould was related to the composer Edvard Grieg
through his mother.  He had another famous, one might say
infamous  ancestor.

>From "At Home with Glenn Gould" on page 68 and 69 of "The Art of Glenn
Gould" by
John Roberts:

Tovell: Actually, you have an interesting ancestry in terms of rebellion
too.

Gould : Oh, yes.  Well, old William Lyon MacKenzie is one of our proud
forebears and I always have felt that I get my interest in things
avant-garde from him, you know.

Does anyone know how GG was related to old WLM?  He seemed rather proud of
this relationship.

William Lyon Mackenzie (1795-1861) was a
journalist, a politician and the leader of the Rebellion of 1837.  He was
expelled from the legislature for publishing libelous attacks on the
government.  He was elected as  the first mayor of Toronto in 1834.  In 1836
he led an armed group of rebels on Toronto hoping to establish an
independent provincial government.  He was defeated and he fled to the
U.S.A.  He tried to organize another rebellion here, but  he was arrested
for
violation of the neutrality laws.   He
spent 18 months in an American jail.  He returned to Canada in 1849 and
spent the rest of his life fighting the Family Compact.   I'd
be proud to be related to this man!


His grandson was William Lyon Mackenzie King, the tenth Prime Minister
of Canada.  WLMK's mother was the 13th child of WLM.

I have tried to look up the descendants of the Mackenzies, but have had no
luck.  The books I got on WLM and WLMK reveal them to be infinitely more
interesting than our school history books acknowledge.

If anyone on this list is a history buff, a study of how GG is related to
WLM
might be interesting.

Anne Smith