The images in this collection are collected from several series of historical photos throughout Osgoode Digital Commons.
If you would like to view the images in their original galleries please follow the links below:
Osgoode@125 Historical Photo ExhibitOsgoode Catalysts
Remembrance Day
Graduating Class Composites
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1952 - Raising Morale
All Osgoode entrants now must have a bachelor’s degree. Despite the more rigorous admission requirements, classes will double in size by 1960. Three years later, the Society announces a $1.3 million investment to expand the Law School to accommodate these larger classes. Dean Smalley-Baker takes to naming each entering class. The class of 1954 were the “Pioneer Guards.”
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1950 - A Rocky Start
Osgoode is still reeling from the loss of its more experienced faculty members and looks to its young, full-time staff members like Allan Leal, Desmond Morton, and Donald Spence to pick up the slack. At least school spirit has improved, thanks to Dean Smalley-Baker reviving the Legal and Literary Society, and by creating new sports teams, clubs, and fraternities. Streetcar on Queen Street East, 1954.
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1950 - “Fair Barristers”
Janet Boland and Judy LaMarsh graduate. The presence of women in a graduating class was frequently commented upon by the press, setting them aside for special comment. Women in the Law School were the exception rather than the rule. Roy McMurtry ’58 remembered that there were only seven women in his graduating class.
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Judy LaMarsh ‘50 (1924-1980)
Judy LaMarsh was born in Chatham, Ontario, and grew up in Niagara Falls. Talented and outspoken, she was a true original. LaMarsh enlisted in the Canadian Women’s Army Corps during WWII , serving as a translator in Intelligence with Japanese-Canadian soldiers. After the war, she attended the University of Toronto and Osgoode Hall Law School. LaMarsh was called to the Bar in 1950 and joined her father’s law practice. She would eventually leave the practice to become a Liberal MP in 1960. In 1963, she became the first Ontario female lawyer and the second woman to ever serve in the federal Cabinet. As the Minister of Health and Welfare, LaMarsh pushed for the adoption of the Canada Pension Plan and Medicare. She also served as the Secretary of State during Canada’s Centennial in 1967. LaMarsh left politics in 1968, to become a journalist for the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation and a lecturer at Osgoode Hall Law School. She helped to establish the Royal Commission on the Status of Women in Canada and advocated for women’s rights for the rest of her life. She was once quoted as saying: “There are hundreds of women, from every walk of life, who would go into politics with some party encouragement.” The Liberal Party created a fund in LaMarsh’s name to provide financial support to female federal Liberal candidates.
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1949 - The Great Divorce
The Law Society’s Committee on Legal Education releases its majority report, recommending that office-based training be improved and that the benchers closely supervise the Law School. Blind-sided by the Society’s decision, Cecil Wright, Bora Laskin, and John Willis leave Osgoode Hall Law School to take up positions at the University of Toronto’s Faculty of Law. Anglophile Charles E. Smalley-Baker is appointed Dean of Osgoode Hall Law School and he begins to undertake a campaign to improve the low student morale.
