The Guy in the Green Truck: A Biography of John St. Amand (review)

John St. Amand, a well-known educator and labour organizer who spent most of his adult life in the Maritimes, died in 2007 at age 66. His death from cancer shocked and saddened his many friends and colleagues across Canada. Over the next several years, they collected stories and reminiscences of St. Amand's full and fruitful life, under the guidance of James McCrorie, professor emeritus at the University of Regina and a long-time friend of St. Amand and his partner, Marilyn Keddy. The Guy in the Green Truck is the final result of this collaboration. McCrorie observes that "this book is not as much a biography as it is a memorial to John St. Amand, whose life deserves to be remembered and reflected upon."

St. Amand was born in 1943 in Brantford, Ontario where he was raised with his three sisters and a brother. His father, John Raymond, was a small engine mechanic, tool and die worker, and welder. His mother, Hilda, worked as a telephone operator upon graduation from grade thirteen. The family moved around southwestern Ontario, as John Raymond sought work to support a young family. St. Amand's mother's athleticism, intellectual interests, and appreciation of music all influenced the young St. Amand. He was a violist and clarinetist in high school, playing in the community bands and orchestras, a practice he would continue throughout his life. St. Amand developed a particularly strong interest in folk music in his adult life and supported local festivals with a passion. It was his healthy athleticism, not his musical interests, however, that led St. Amand to leave southern Ontario after high school and head east to the Maritimes. In 1962, he was recruited to play football at Dalhousie University in Halifax. This proved to be an exciting time for this first-generation university student. He certainly found success on the gridiron in the physically grueling position of a lineman. He followed up his university football career playing for the Halifax Buccaneers. St. Amand did not have comparable success in the classroom and dropped out of university before finishing his degree. He returned to university after a two-year hiatus to pursue his interest in sociology. Dalhousie's politically progressive sociology department with the likes of Herbert Gamberg and James Stolzman significantly influenced St. Amand's political development, especially his interest in Marxism. His interest in Marxism and the New Left, though, was not simply academic but rooted in his family experiences in industrial Ontario. St. Amand decided to pursue these interests in graduate school and enrolled in Dalhousie's M.A. program. He graduated from the program in 1972 upon the completion of his thesis on Marxism and the sociology of religion. A year earlier, St. Amand had returned to Brantford to be near his family and to take up a teaching position at Mohawk College of Applied Arts and Technology in nearby Hamilton.

St. Amand threw himself into his teaching at Mohawk College. He developed a reputation as a committed teacher who did not limit his interest in his students to the classroom. Reflecting the politics of the period and St. Amand's intellectual concerns, he developed courses in labour studies and collective bargaining. St. Amand also spent much of his time traveling about the countryside in his green pickup truck with a camper fixed to it. In 1971, 300 workers at the Texpack plant in Brantford were locked out by the company in what became a bitter dispute over union recognition, wages, and working conditions. St. Amand attended a rally at which Kent Rowley and Madeleine Parent, leaders of the Canadian Textile and Chemical Workers Union (ctcu) spoke. The meeting changed St. Amand's life. After listening to Rowley and Parent, Amand recalled later: "I can't remember when I was so fired up about a fight as I was that night. In looking back, my first introduction to Madeleine's struggles-the Texpack strike-thoroughly unforgettable. To...