Joseph Edmund Crawford

He served on Fort William city council and was mayor from 1926 to 1928. Crawford was an unsuccessful candidate for a seat in the provincial assembly in 1929, but took 41% of the vote. He served on the Board of Education and was director of the local YMCA. He was president of the local Chamber of Commerce and vice-president of the Fort William Red Cross Society. Crawford also served as auditor of Thunder Bay Films, one of the few professional motion picture companies operating in Canada during the 1920s.^[2]

First elected in the Hepburn sweep of June 1934, he easily defeated Conservative Franklin Harford Spence 9100 votes to 5375, but when he opposed Hepburn's separate school legislation, he was challenged for the Liberal nomination by Roman Catholic Harry Murphy who ran in the October 1937 election as the official Liberal candidate. Crawford ran as an Independent Liberal, such that the Liberal vote split, permitting Frank Spence to retake the riding for the Conservatives.

• Canadian Parliamentary Guide, 1937, AL Normandin
• F. Brent Scollie, Thunder Bay Mayors & Councillors 1873-1945 (Thunder Bay Historical Museum Society, 2000), 170-171.

• Ontario Legislative Assembly parliamentary history
• Fort William City Councils 1920-1929 Mayor Joseph Edmund Crawford