Conrad Black

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Lore & Background

Conrad Black was born in Montreal, Quebec, to a family originally from Winnipeg, Manitoba. His father, George Montegu Black Jr., a chartered accountant, was the president of Canadian Breweries Limited. In 1978, two years after their father's death, Conrad and his older brother Montegu took majority control of the Ravelston Corporation. Over the next seven years, Conrad Black sold off most of their non-media holdings to focus on newspaper publishing. He was granted a life peerage in 2001 and gave up his Canadian citizenship to accept the title in light of the Nickle Resolution; he regained his Canadian citizenship in 2023. Black was convicted on four counts of fraud in a United States district court in Chicago in 2007. While two of the criminal fraud charges were overturned on appeal, a conviction for felony fraud and obstruction of justice was upheld in 2010 and he was re-sentenced to 42 months in prison and a fine of $125,000. In 2019, President Donald Trump granted him a federal pardon. Black has written eleven books, mostly in the fields of Canadian and American history, including biographies of Quebec premier Maurice Duplessis and US presidents Franklin D. Roosevelt, Richard Nixon and Donald Trump, as well as two memoirs. He has also hosted two interview shows on the Canadian cable network VisionTV. A political conservative, he belonged to the UK's Conservative Party, but also has some idiosyncratic views, including his support for Roosevelt's New Deal. Black was received into the Roman Catholic Church on 18 June 1986 by Gerald Emmett Cardinal Carter, Archbishop of Toronto, at the cardinal's official residence. In 2001, Black was invested as a Knight Commander of the Order of St. Gregory the Great, a Papal order of chivalry awarded by Pope John Paul II and delivered by Cardinals Carter and Aloysius Ambrozic. He has written a column for the National Post since he founded it in 1998.

Reader's Guide

Conrad Black's significance lies in his rise and fall as a major newspaper publisher who built a global media empire, only to be convicted of fraud in the United States. His career illustrates the intersection of business, politics, and law, as well as the consequences of corporate governance failures. Black's life peerage and subsequent pardon by a US president highlight his unique transatlantic status. His writings, including biographies of several US presidents and a Quebec premier, contribute to historical and political discourse. His legacy remains contested: some view him as a visionary publisher and intellectual, others as a symbol of corporate excess and legal overreach. His return to Canadian citizenship in 2023 and continued column writing keep him in public view.

Did You Know?

• At age eight, Black invested his life savings of $60 in one share of General Motors.
• He was expelled from Upper Canada College for selling stolen exam papers, then expelled from Trinity College School for insubordinate behaviour.
• Black's first book was based on his McGill master's thesis on Quebec premier Maurice Duplessis, for which he gained access to Duplessis' personal papers including a ledger listing political contributions of every tavern-keeper in the province.
• He and his wife Barbara Amiel exchanged over 11,000 emails, as revealed in courtroom evidence.
• Black was invested as a Knight Commander of the Order of St. Gregory the Great, a Papal order of chivalry, in 2001.