Fonds consists of textual material including correspondence, briefs, drafts, and reference material dealing with Croll's work as Co-Chairman of the Special Joint Committee on Consumer Credit and Chairman of Special Senate Committees on Aging, on Poverty and on Retirement Age Policies. Textual records have been divided into nine series as follows: Biographical and Personal; Military Career; Subject Files; Clippings (most pre-1965); Speeches; Parliamentary Committees; Subject Files Relating to Senate Committee Work; Library of Parliament Research Branch Reports; and Arthur W. Roebuck, unpublished memoirs given to Cross for his opinion, 1960. This material includes personal, military, medical and dental records, newspaper clippings and magazine articles regarding Senator Croll; and Senator Croll's military file, 1939-1945. These records were created in Toronto, Ontario.
Fonds also consists of photographic material documenting aspects of Senator Croll's political career, his relationship to the Jewish community and his participation in the Canadian Army.
Also included in the fonds is a portrait of Senator David Cross by Senator Arthur W. Roebuck.
Fonds also includes a map detailing political and administrative divisions in the U.S.S.R. using Russian cyrillic script.
Croll, David Arnold, 1900-1991 : David Croll was born at Moscow, Russia, and came to Canada in 1901. He was educated at the University of Toronto and at Osgoode Hall Law School, and was called to the bar in 1925. He practised law at Windsor and Toronto. He was Mayor of Windsor, Ontario, 1930-1934 and 1938-1941. While Liberal Member of the Ontario Legislature for Windsor-Walkerville, 1934-1943, Croll was Minister of Public Welfare and Municipal Affairs, 1934-1937, and Minister of Labour, 1935-1937. He resigned in 1937 over Premier Hepburn's handling of the General Motors strike in Oshawa. During the Second World War he was on active service with the army, enlisting in 1940 as a private and leaving in 1945 with the rank of Lieutenant-Colonel. Croll was Liberal Member of Parliament for Toronto-Spadina, 1945-1955, during which time he was active on many committees and was Chairman of the committee that reviewed the Bank Act. In 1955 he became the first person of Jewish descent to be appointed to the Canadian Senate. As a Senator, he initiated a number of inquiries that subsequently led to Government legislation. From 1960-1964 he presented bills that sought to compel those selling goods on credit to disclose the interest rate clearly and understandably, and he consequently became Co-Chairman of the Special Joint Committee of the Senate and House of Commons on Consumer Credit, 1964-1967, a Committee that was subsequently re-constituted to inquire into prices. He was Chairman of the Special Senate Committee on Aging, 1963-1966, Chairman of the Special Senate Committee on Poverty, 1968-1971, and Chairman of the Special Senate Committee on Retirement Age Policies, 1978-1980. He was also a member of many other Senate committees. He continued to play an active role in the work of the Senate until his death.
