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George Victor Ferguson
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Journalist.
Born in Cupar, Fife, Scotland on 20 April 1897, son of Rev. James Thompson Ferguson (1855-1928) and Maud Mant Martin (1862-1939), he came with his parents to Nelson, British Columbia in 1903, and in 1912 moved to Calgary, Alberta. During the First World War, he served in France with the 196th Battalion.
On his return to Canada after the war, he attended the University of Alberta where he was chosen as a Rhodes Scholar. In 1923, he received a BA degree from Christ Church, Oxford. While at Oxford he heard John Wesley Dafoe speak and decided that this was the man for whom he wanted to work. He joined the staff of the Manitoba Free Press in 1925 where he soon became one of the most distinguished of “Dafoe’s young men” including J. B. McGeachy, Thomas Beattie Roberton, Bruce Hutchison, and D. B. McCrae.
In the late 1930s, he began political broadcasts on CBC Radio. On Dafoe’s death in 1944, he took over as Executive Editor of the Free Press, quitting abruptly in 1946 when he decided that he did not like the job. He moved to Montreal, Quebec where he worked for the international service of the CBC, later becoming Editor of the Montreal Star, from which he retired in 1968. He was also well known as a television commentator and speaker in the field of foreign affairs.
On 27 December 1930, he married Mary Simpson Doupe (1906-?, daughter of Jacob L. Doupe) at Winnipeg and they had two sons.
He died at Montreal, Quebec on 26 January 1977.
His articles for the Manitoba Historical Society:
The Canadian Newspaper Today
MHS Transactions, Series 3, 1959-60 Season
Attestation papers, Canadian Expeditionary Force, Library and Archives Canada.
Marriage registration [George Victor Ferguson, Mary Simpson Doupe], Manitoba Vital Statistics.
“Ex-editor of Free Press, Montreal Star dies at 79,” Winnipeg Free Press, 27 January 1977.
“George V. Ferguson,” Winnipeg Free Press, 28 January 1977, page 67.
Obituary, Winnipeg Free Press, 29 January 1977, page 100.
George Victor Ferguson, FindAGrave.
This page was prepared by Gordon Goldsborough.
Page revised: 6 November 2025
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