From Prison to Parliament

About the Book

Frank Howard's mother was a prostitute; his father, purportedly her pimp. When he was six months old they placed him in the care of foster parents who never let him forget that he was the child of those "...no-good sons of bitches...".

At twelve he was committed by a judge to the care of the Childrens' Aid Society and taken to an orphanage in Vancouver. En route he was sexually molested by the policeman accompanying him. Dumped into the foster care circuit, he twice attempted suicide. He never finished grade ten. At eighteen he was sentenced to two years in the B.C. Penitentiary for armed robbery.

In From Prison to Parliament Howard describes those early years, his life in prison, and how, on finishing his sentence, he vowed never to return to crime. He never did.

He became a logger, then President of the Loggers' Local of the I.W.A. At twenty-eight he entered politics as a C.C.F. M.L.A. and went on to become the M.P. for the Northern B.C. riding of Skeena. He held that seat for seventeen years, longer than anyone else since its formation in 1914. During his twenty-seven years as a politician, he won ten elections.

Frank Howard was decidedly instrumental in getting Aboriginal people who lived on reserves the right to vote in federal elections. His three-year filibuster in the House of Commons produced reforms to Canada's divorce laws. His passion for prison reform led to the closure of Canada's barbaric Saint Vincent de Paul Penitentiary.

Blunt, tough, Frank Howard pulls no punches in describing some of his C.C.F./ N.D.P. fellow politicians. Reading From Prison to Parliament, it's easy to understand how his street smarts served his constituents, while at the same time infuriating other politicians.

About the Author

• Born in Kimberley, B.C., but not sure of birth date, birth year, or family name. Raised by foster parents.
• Erratic elementary schooling.
• At the age of twelve a judge sentenced him to spend six years in the care of the Children's Aid Society. A Provincial Police Officer took him to Vancouver where he was deposited in the Alexander Children's Home.
• Lived with two other foster parents in Vancouver. His formal education was not consistent. Ran away twice to return to Kimberley. Left school before completing grade ten.
• At the age of eighteen was sentenced to two years in the B.C. Penitentiary for armed robbery.
• While in the Penitentiary he determined that a life of crime was not for him. Promised himself never to steal again. He hasn't.
• Following his release from prison (1945) he worked at various hourly-paid jobs such as iron-foundry moulding, underground mining, and logging. While logging he became a yarding engineer and was an active union member of the International Woodworkers of America (IWA).
• In 1950 he was elected the President of the IWA's Loggers' Local (1-71), a position he held for seven years.
• While President of the Loggers' Local he ran, unsuccessfully, as a CCF candidate in B.C.'s 1952 provincial election. In the follow-up 1953 election he was elected as the first CCF Member of the Legislative Assembly (MLA) for the provincial riding of Skeena. He was defeated in 1956.
• Was elected as the Member of Parliament (MP) for the federal riding of Skeena in 1957. He held that seat for seventeen years, longer than anyone else since the the riding was formed in 1914. He was defeated in 1974.
• In 1967 a blackmailer threatened him and demanded money to keep silent. He met it head on, refused to succumb and revealed his background on a television station in his home town of Terrace.
• In 1979 he returned to the provincial political scene and was elected once again as the MLA for Skeena. He was re-elected in 1983 and defeated in 1986.
• His son Robert, born in 1950, died of AIDS in 1986.
• He was divorced from his first wife. He remarried and his second wife died of cancer. He and his wife Joane Humphrey (writer/broadcaster J.J. McColl) live in Surrey, B.C. where he is writing a novel.