130 years ago:
In 1872, I was appointed editor of the “Presbyterian” a monthly magazine of the Church of Scotland in Canada, which afforded congenial employment in the meantime, leading up to the editorship in 1875 of the “Presbyterian Record,” the official organ of the Presbyterian Church in Canada, in which I continued until December, 1891, when I retired, being then in my 70th year, receiving an honorarium of one thousand dollars and many very kind letters from leading ministers of the Church in Canada and elsewhere.”
So writes James Croil of Montreal in his eponymous autobiography published in 1918, two years after his death.
Twenty-six pages later, however, Mr. Croil records that: “In 1876, June 16th, the Church Agent of our Old Kirk Synod was appointed editor of the Presbyterian Record at an annual salary of six hundred dollars.” Proving perhaps that even eminent journalists can have conflicting opinions with themselves about alleged facts! That said, it is the latter date that we acknowledge as the beginning of the Presbyterian Record which, though no longer the “official organ,” has continued since then to be a monthly magazine for Presbyterians in Canada.
Click here for an excerpt from our inaugural issue (PDF file, 108kb).
