The Stanley G. Grizzle fonds consists textual records, photographs, sound recordings and objects relating to the life and work of Stanley G. Grizzle as Sleeping Car Porter, union leader, and activist. Textual records relate to Mr. Grizzle's involvement with the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters union, including correspondence, grievances, research into its history, conventions, minute books and case files, as well as records relating to Mr. Grizzle's research into Canadian black history, research for his columns in Contrast newspaper, records of his involvement with various organizations, including the Martin Luther King Fund, the Urban Alliance for Race Relations, and Home Service. Audio material consists mainly of oral histories of sleeping car porters taken by Mr. Grizzle as part of research for his book, My Name is Not George.
Grizzle, Stanley G, 1918-2016 : Stanley G. Grizzle was born November 18th, 1918 in Toronto to Jamaican-born parents. He served in the Canadian Army (Corporal) in Canada and Europe from 1942-1946. From 1940-1960 he was employed as a Sleeping Car Porter at the Canadian Pacific Railway Company. He was heavily involved in the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters, serving as Vice-President, Toronto CPR division from 1950-1953 and President and Chairman of the Grievance Committee from 1953-1959, during which time he acted as a delegate at many conventions, conferences, and seminars on human rights and labour issues. He was actively involved in promoting human rights for black people in Canada, including as a member of the Toronto Labour Committee for Human Rights, which successfully lobbied the CPR to hire black men in the classification of Sleeping Car Conductors, making CPR the first North American Railway company to hire black people in this classification.
In 1959 he ran for the Ontario Legislature as a candidate for CCF party, making him the first black person to run in for a seat in the Ontario Legislative Assembly. In the 1960s he continued his work fighting racism and discrimination, publishing as a booklet entitled Discrimination-Our Achilles Heel. During this time he also served on the board of the Toronto Negro Business and Professional Men's Association, first as Chairman of the History Committee and later as President, and as a member of the Committee for the Adoption of Coloured Youngsters, a group that studied and advocated for the adoption of black children. He was also involved in the Martin Luther King Fund of Toronto, serving as first as Chairman and later as secretary, and served as an Executive member of the Jamaican Canadian Association of Toronto. In the early 1970s he was associate editor and author of a column entitled Grizzle's Granules at Contrast, a Toronto based black newspaper.
In the early 1960s, Mr. Grizzle accepted a position as an Officer with the Ontario Labour Relations Board - a position he held until 1978. That year, Mr. Grizzle was also the first member of a trade union appointed to the position of Judge in the Canadian Court of Citizenship. Grizzle received the Order of Ontario in 1990 from Lieutenant-Governor Lincoln Alexander, and in 1994, Grizzle was appointed to the Order of Canada, as well as inducted into the Canadian Labour Hall of Fame. He published a book entitled My Name's Not George: The Story of the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters in Canada in 1998.
On November 1, 2007, a small park in Mr. Grizzle's neighbourhood in Toronto, formerly Main Street Parkette, was renamed the Stanley G. Grizzle Parkette.
Stanley Grizzle died on November 12, 2016.
