I had no idea who Max Aitken was until very recently. I swung by a small independent bookstore called Tidewater Books in Sackville one afternoon and found a biography of Beaverbook in the Extraordinary Canadians series.
David Adams Richards, the author and the Bard of Miramichi, had childhood experiences much overlapping Beaverbrook’s and likely looked out the same windows and played in the same ravines as Aitken.
Max Aitken was born in Ontario, moved to New Brunswick, where he developed a knack for politics, communication and business. He made scores of money in Canada and moved to England where he became, quickly, a grand media mogul, politician, and propagandist. He was friends with Churchill (back when that wasn’t popular) and eventually served in the wartime cabinet. Through all this, he earned a Lordship and offended the aristocracy by picking a reference to his New Brunswick roots and calling himself Beaverbrook.
Aitken had many faults. He cheated on his wife, without question. That said, it wasn’t entirely clear the marriage wasn’t political anyway. He was scheming in business but it’s become clear that his colleagues were scheming against him as well.
Beaverbrook is one of New Brunswick’s favourite sons. It’s odd to say that because the accusation of arrogance stuck to him. New Brunswickers don’t have much time for arrogance. I suspect what Londoners called arrogance was actually just Miramichi playfulness, and slyness; curiosity more than condescension. Beaverbrook believed that the British Empire was for everyone not just the elites. He devoted a good deal of time to the idea of Empire Free Trade. It was viewed as too late, the Empire was in decline.
I can’t help but feel some connection to Beaverbrook. We share a first name. We both were born in Ontario and moved to New Brunswick, believe passionately in the idea of an Empire for everyone. The playfulness, the penchant for late night meals (Aitken would call his friends at 1 or 2 AM and invite them for dessert), the arrogance; I connect with these. I connect with the love of the spotlight, but also the loneliness that Beaverbrook felt, which hasn’t been explored enough. I might be no different than Richards, trying to understand more about Beaverbrook and attaching myself to this little man who did big things.
Beaverbrook is one of the greatest Canadians of all time. He is certainly one of the greatest New Brunswickers of all time. He has become an icon here of how far a boy from Miramichi or Sackville or the city – Saint John, Moncton, Fredericton – can fly.
His brilliant and creative handling of the wartime portfolios he was assigned may have saved England. I’m not the only one who thinks that. Aitken defended Churchill when he needed a friend the most. There are other contributions Aitken made that are forgotten. He established the Canadian War Records Office in London, which recognized the contributions of Canadians in the First World War. He made financial and civic contributions to New Brunswick that are lasting to this day. This province is too often forgotten by Ottawa, let alone London. Beaverbrook never forgot it.
He speaks with great love for New Brunswick, despite not being born there, and living many years in London, especially during the war. I understand his pull for the place, and I understand why he so desperately wanted to call it home.
Beaverbrook has become of my heroes. He’s not a hero in the way of a soldier, he’s not a hero in the sense of an activist. His heroism is distinct. It is defined by a quiet old man, once at the beating heart of the greatest empire in world history, walking through Newcastle, New Brunswick, counting memories.
So thanks, Beaverbrook, from one imperial Max from New Brunswick to another.
