Raymond Reierson (October 7, 1919 – January 30, 2020) was a politician from

Alberta Alberta ( ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada. It is part of Western Canada and is one of the three prairie provinces. Alberta is bordered by British Columbia to the west, Saskatchewan to the east, the Northwest Ter ...

, Canada. He served in the

Legislative Assembly of Alberta The Legislative Assembly of Alberta is the deliberative assembly of the province of Alberta, Canada. It sits in the Alberta Legislature Building in Edmonton. The Legislative Assembly currently has 87 members, elected first past the post from sing ...

from 1952 to 1971 as a member of the Social Credit caucus in government. Reierson held numerous portfolios in the governments of Premier

Ernest Manning Ernest Charles Manning, (September 20, 1908 – February 19, 1996), a Canadian politician, was the eighth Premier of Alberta between 1943 and 1968 for the Social Credit Party of Alberta. He served longer than any other premier in Alberta's histo ...

and

Harry Strom Harry Edwin Strom (July 7, 1914 – October 2, 1984) was the ninth premier of Alberta, from 1968 to 1971. His two-and-a-half years as Premier were the last of the thirty-six-year Social Credit dynasty, as his defeat by Peter Lougheed saw its r ...

from 1955 to 1971. He was born in Edberg in 1919, the son of Reier and Bertha C. (née Sorensen) Reierson.

Political career

Reierson first ran for the Alberta Legislature as the Social Credit candidate in the electoral district of

St. Paul Paul; grc, Παῦλος, translit=Paulos; cop, ⲡⲁⲩⲗⲟⲥ; hbo, פאולוס השליח (previously called Saul of Tarsus;; ar, بولس الطرسوسي; grc, Σαῦλος Ταρσεύς, Saũlos Tarseús; tr, Tarsuslu Pavlus; ...

in the 1952 general election. He narrowly defeated Liberal candidate Laval Fortier to hold the seat for his party. In the 1955 general election Reierson defeated Liberal candidate J.R. Sweeney with over half the popular vote. On August 2, 1955, Premier

appointed Reierson Minister of Industries and Labour. He was re-elected in the 1959 Alberta election with a very solid majority. On September 1, 1959, Premier Manning changed Reierson's portfolio to Labour. He was re-elected in the 1963 general election with over half the popular vote in his district. Reierson was re-elected in the 1967 general election in a race against three other candidates. After the election Premier Manning gave Reierson a second portfolio, the Minister of Education, in addition to the Labour portfolio. A year later Reierson entered the 1968 leadership contest. He finished third on the first ballot and withdrew from the race. On December 12, 1968,

, the new premier, retained Reierson in the Labour portfolio and added the Telephones portfolio to Reierson's responsibilities. In 1970, as Minister of Telephones, Reierson lobbied the

Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission The Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC; french: Conseil de la radiodiffusion et des télécommunications canadiennes, links=) is a public organization in Canada with mandate as a regulatory agency for broadcasti ...

to give

Alberta Government Telephones Alberta Government Telephones (AGT) was the telephone provider in most of Alberta from 1906 to 1991. AGT was formed by the Liberal government of Alexander Cameron Rutherford in 1906Wilson, Kevin G., Deregulating Telecommunications: U.S. and C ...

exclusive control of distributing television content from the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 U.S. state, states, a Washington, D.C., federal district, five ma ...

. He believed his plan would lower subscriber costs from $6 a month at the time to $1 a month and allow the best content from the three US networks in operation at the time. This was in response to new CRTC rules that only allowed cable providers to carry one US Commercial station. Reierson was defeated in the 1971 general election by Progressive Conservative candidate Mick Fluker.

Later life and death

In 2006 Reierson, Nick Dushenski and Arthur Dixon visited the Alberta Legislature as its most senior former members during its centennial celebration. He

turned 100 A centenarian is a person who has reached the age of 100 years. Because life expectancies worldwide are below 100 years, the term is invariably associated with longevity. In 2012, the United Nations estimated that there were 316,600 living cente ...

in 2019 and died in January 2020.Raymond Reierson obituary
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References

External links

Legislative Assembly of Alberta Members Listing
{{DEFAULTSORT:Reierson, Raymond 1919 births 2020 deaths Alberta Social Credit Party MLAs Canadian centenarians Members of the Executive Council of Alberta Men centenarians