William James Asselstine (July 1, 1891 – August 21, 1973) was an engineer, gold miner and political figure in

British Columbia British Columbia is the westernmost Provinces and territories of Canada, province of Canada. Situated in the Pacific Northwest between the Pacific Ocean and the Rocky Mountains, the province has a diverse geography, with rugged landscapes that ...

. He represented Atlin from 1933 to 1945 as a Liberal and from 1956 to 1960 as a

Social Credit Social credit is a distributive philosophy of political economy developed in the 1920s and 1930s by C. H. Douglas. Douglas attributed economic downturns to discrepancies between the cost of goods and the compensation of the workers who made t ...

member in the

Legislative Assembly of British Columbia The Legislative Assembly of British Columbia () is the deliberative assembly of the Legislature of British Columbia, in the province of British Columbia, Canada. The other component of the Legislature is the lieutenant governor of British Columbi ...

. He was born in

Renfrew, Ontario Renfrew is a town on the Bonnechere River in Renfrew County, Ontario, Canada. Located one hour west of Ottawa in Eastern Ontario, Renfrew is the fourth largest town in the county after Petawawa, Pembroke and Arnprior. The town is a small tran ...

in 1891, the son of Samuel Asselstine and Jessie Wilson, and was educated in

Verona Verona ( ; ; or ) is a city on the Adige, River Adige in Veneto, Italy, with 255,131 inhabitants. It is one of the seven provincial capitals of the region, and is the largest city Comune, municipality in the region and in Northeast Italy, nor ...

and

Sydenham Sydenham may refer to: Places Australia * Sydenham, New South Wales, a suburb of Sydney ** Sydenham railway station, Sydney * Sydenham, Victoria, a suburb of Melbourne ** Sydenham railway line, the name of the Sunbury railway line, Melbourne un ...

. In 1906, he married a Miss Ida Carr. He was a member of the

Canadian Expeditionary Force The Canadian Expeditionary Force (CEF; French: ''Corps expéditionnaire canadien'') was the expeditionary warfare, expeditionary field force of Canada during the First World War. It was formed on August 15, 1914, following United Kingdom declarat ...

during

World War I World War I or the First World War (28 July 1914 – 11 November 1918), also known as the Great War, was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War I, Allies (or Entente) and the Central Powers. Fighting to ...

. Asselstine served in the provincial cabinet as Minister of Mines, Minister of Trade and Industry and Minister of Labour. He ran unsuccessfully for reelection in 1960 and 1963 as a Social Credit member. He died August 21, 1973, aged 82.

References

1891 births 1973 deaths People from Renfrew County BC United MLAs British Columbia Social Credit Party MLAs 20th-century members of the Legislative Assembly of British Columbia {{BCUnited-BritishColumbia-MLA-stub